Pining for “The Good, Ole Days”

Be not lax in celebrating

Be not Lazy in the festive service of God

Be ablaze with enthusiasm

Let us be an alive, burning offering before the altar of God

- Saint Hildegard of Bingen

As church enrollment and budgets have declined, I have been frustrated with faith communities and faith community leaders whose sole response is to pine for the good old days. Yes, I know there has to be grief involved.

But sometimes I think we forget the long view. Namely, the church has only flourished like it did in the good, old days for a couple generations. Before that, church life was often a struggle to cobble plans and programs together, to scrape together the money for a church building, and to bring multiple generations into the life of the church. For example, Sunday School is a recent invention. We find ourselves, however, maintaining Sunday School rooms with the only plan being that we hope kids will someday return.

My hope is that we can begin to dream what God may be dreaming for us in future generations. How can we use our church buildings or properties in creative and novel ways to experience community, celebration, and fun? How can we use our smaller numbers to focus on what is really important mission in our day and age?

Instead of pining for the glory days, maybe we could start stitching together a smaller and more nimble day of goodness, celebration, and justice? I hate dreading and vexing over not being what we were or what we don’t have.

We have you. And that person who sits way over there in the next pew. So let’s go. Let’s find a path together.

To that end, the Southwest Association Meeting will be at Tower Hill in Sawyer (my home!) on Saturday, May 4, from 12:30 to 4:30 p.m. We are trying to design something for children, grades 1 to 6 to start imagining a church that is intergenerational, locomotive, and celebratory for that age group. I hope you will join us! - Pastor Mike